TEDS – The Journey So Far

it would be fun to do play tricks on

people it would be wouldn't it we're

just very

boring twins one of the most perfect

natural resources for scientific

research the physical similarities of

identical twins have always been

fascinating but it's only in recent

decades that researchers have recognized

the important role that Twins play in

research although we might look the same

or un sound the same like our

personalties are totally totally

different by studying the differences

between identical and nonidentical pairs

of twins it's possible to untangle the

huge and complex nature nurture debate

we can see how the environment and our

genes interact and affect everything

from how well we do it school to

understanding

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autism this is the story of teds the

twin's early development study Ted's is

the largest ongoing twin study of its

kind in the world it includes over

15,000 families with twins followed from

birth for more than 20 years providing

researchers with a powerful resource to

help improve the prevention diagnosis

and treatment of many health issues

understand how and where we live affects

us and helps us know more about our

potential and limitations as human

beings across the globe more than 100

collaborators are working on projects

using data from teds more than 300

scientific papers based on teds have

been published almost half of those in

the past 5 years alone so weird how many

minutes apart were you born eight but

she always says respect your elders like

to celebrate the 20th birthday of teds

we'll go behind the scenes meet some of

the Twins and share some of the Insight

unlocked from the enormous wealth of

data created over the last two

decades why do children differ so much

in their progress in the early years at

school

why do some develop certain diseases and

conditions and others

not the data generated by teds can help

us answer many different questions

without twins this type of research

would be nearly impossible to

conduct the beauty of twin studies is

that they provide a natural experimental

design because there are two types of

twins first you have the identical twins

who are creat created from a single

fertilized egg and so they are

genetically identical a bit like clones

exact same genetic material whereas

non-identical twins are made when two

eggs are fertilized at the same time so

they're no more similar genetically than

normal siblings are but of course both

types of twins are reared in the uh

uterine environment together and then

reared in the family environment

together but one type of twins shares

all their genetic material and the other

one only half and it's that distinction

between them that we can use because

anything that has a genetic influence

will show greater similarity between

members of an identical twin pair then

it will in members of a non-identical

twin pair so then we can compare the

similarity for The Identical Pairs and

the non-identical pairs and that then

indicates the level of genetic influence

on the trait that we're interested

in since 1998 teds has gathered data

from both identical and non-identical

twin Pairs and compared similarities to

find out how genes and environments

shape our development from birth to

Young

adulthood most scientists now believe

that both genes and environment play a

role in how we develop but their

relative importance is still

disputed only long-term studies like

teds can provide hard

evidence the home of teds is the social

genetic and developmental Psychiatry

Center

which is part of the Institute of

Psychiatry Psychology and Neuroscience

at Kings College London the sgdp was set

up in the mid 1990s and the idea was to

be the first center that brought

together research not just about

genetics not just about developmental

psychology not just about social

Psychiatry but bringing all of them

together and having a really

interdisciplinary approach to studying

psychology and Psychiatry um and so some

leading international Figures were

brought together to start this V off and

of course one of those was Robert plin

who came over with Judy dun and started

the twins early development study Review

Committee that agreed to the

funding um said you know okay but you

won't recruit people at anything higher

than senior lectur level and so I said

well I'm not in the least bit interested

in doing that uh we have to have stars

uh International Stars uh because what

we want to do requires people who are

really creative the key people that time

uh were Robert pman a geneticist um and

Judy dun a social

psychologist and uh Robert and Judy

shared my view very much that we needed

to bring all these things

together Chicago born Robert pman and

his British born wife professor Judy

done have spent a lifetime investigating

the genetic and environmental origins of

psychological traits Robert has

published more than 500 papers and a

dozen books on behavioral genetics I

think the Institute was Keen to get Judy

done and me to come and it wasn't phony

at all because we were kind of a

microcosm of what the center is she

comes from a social environmental

ethological background I come more from

a genetics background so we were sort of

um uh the Paradigm in a way and Mike

ruers saw that and for himself it was

quite a big step he was known as kind of

an environmental researcher but he was

realizing then in the 90s that genetics

is important in 1995 Robert set about

getting permission and funding to

establish the first systematic study of

newborn twins in the

UK I'm not fatalistic but you have to

pay attention when things want to work

out so you know and when I came to

England I just had lunch with this

person in the office for National

statistics and I thought you know sure

I'm going to ask them for the birth

records of twins well first it turned

out that they were computerized

beginning 93 in

1993 so before then you would have been

shuffling through millions of pieces of

paper in '93 it's computerized and they

put on the birth certificate in 1993

whether it was a multiple birth so that

made the searching part easy and then

when we could prove that we could get

these twins about 7,500 pairs born a

year and we decided to go for three

birth cohorts birs in 1994 95 96 so

that' be on the order of 21,000 pairs of

twins the MRC came through right away

with the money for this in in 1995 and

that's how the project began and the MRC

has continued to fund it for 20

years people from North London who brag

about never coming to South London don't

realize there's this huge research

Empire here we have some brain stuff

going on down here genetics molecular

genetics there's DNA stuff over here and

bringing that together with Psychiatry

there's no one who can be expert in all

those things it requires an

interdisciplinary approach with people

who want to collaborate with each other

did you know that the world record

holders for the oldest living twins are

103 years old Evelyn and Edith

renie and it's actually a myth that

twins Skipper generation I think we

respond to situations differently and we

have different interests and different

Hobbies like she's really creative and

stuff and I'm just more academic can't

draw or just can't draw I really can't

draw

so so the early part of teds was about

understanding how cognitive and language

development Link in with emotional and

behavioral development over those

important preschool years 2 three and

four and and we did something really

Innovative actually designed our own

measures of cognitive and language

development that could be done by the

families in the homes themselves so they

became our testers and nobody had ever

done that before and it was really

exciting and we got an enormous amount

of data when you think about how busy

families with two three or four year-old

old twins must be I mean I have children

quite close in age and I really take my

hat off to the mall for managing to fit

it in I asked Mom why we did it and she

was oh it was in the pack when I knew I

was having twins cuz she didn't know

till quite late on that she was having

twins yeah we got a little Ted's t-shirt

and it's got baby twins on and that's

just the size of it shows how young we

were when we got home but we think the

earliest memory of teds was when we was

doing the um DNA swabs at home and our

dad had to convince us that it wouldn't

hurt that it was just going to tickle

and it would be fine yeah we sent them

booklets with um little bits of

equipment to used and and things that

they should ask their children to do and

we got great data out of it about how

their um language was developing about

how their um General cognitive ability

was developing and about emotional and

behavioral um Expressions that they were

showing and then looked at the links

amongst those and looked at the

influence of both genes and environment

on each of them independently and on

their links together so this is a

four-year study and essentially we're

looking at

um some visualization measures so we're

looking at the twins abilities to find

um pairs images that are identical and

of course it starts off with quite

simple um pairs be it find the two

squares find the two

triangles as they became older the twins

themselves were able to complete the

tests I remember the first heads we did

got down school to get paid and and we

never got like there were toys and and

then you could choose the toys or like

the money and both of us just chose the

money all the time that sort of shows

what people were

like they've been with us since we've

been small they've given us home visits

um they're kind of always part of our

they're always with us and um and they

never forget our birthdays we're always

getting a birthday card from them as

well I remember having to to do one

where I'd have to look at like eyes but

just eyes and trying and work out what

emotion they were expressing I thought

so difficult right it was so hard wasn't

it they ask us how much alcohol we drink

each week they ask us if we smoke

theories well we don't smoke about the

alcohol

theories Ted's families have taken part

studies at regular intervals throughout

their lives and tests for smaller groups

are added all the time over here we have

um some ladies doing their mailing so we

have a mailing out that's coming for uh

Ted's bricks study we want to know

whether spatial rotation and spatial

visualization are different or the same

abilities and whether they are different

in 2D or 3D environment we're sending

out 4,000 of these to the Twins and uh

they're going out this week

the Ted's database is vast over here we

have our data manager Andy who so he's

really responsible for colleting all of

the data and accessing all of the

information that we have from over

20,000 twins so really without um his

input we couldn't couldn't do what we do

individuals in the data set are not

identifiable in any way dates of birth

and names are

removed each family has an encrypted

unique

identifier we of exposed like another

pair of identical twins who we kind of

like laxed on to which at the time

seemed completely like normal but now in

hindsight it must have looked a bit odd

for people and cuz um our mom's

identical twin as well so that made it

that made it actually a lot better I

think growing up because she she kind of

had a little bit more of an

understanding of what how not how twins

should be treated but what how to avoid

coming across as being like the

identical or same person yeah so we

would always kind of dress reasonably

differently and things yeah it makes me

kind of cringe thinking about having

having to like swap clothes and things

like that we're at exactly the same

taste in music the same taste in clothes

the same taste in TV so like we said we

show each other's clothes because we

just have the same fashion sense so if I

see something on Tasha I think oh that

looks really great can I take it well

it's normally the other way t comes and

raids my wardrobes and says can I wear

this can I take this can I take this

it's like a shopping trip when she comes

around my house it's great so no same

music same music yeah if Tesha made a CD

I'll be like oh can you make me one as

well because we like the same things no

it's quite handy actually TV Watchers

saying we're both into all that cheesy

the only Way's eics made in Char sha

that sort of stuff we both love it yeah

that's the same

yeah although the so-called nature

nurture debate has been going on for a

century Ted's and many other studies

around the world have made it clear that

nature or genetics plays a very major

role in

education during its 20 years teds has

contributed a major shift towards

recognizing the importance of genetics

in the development of differences

between children in their learning

skills and educational

achievement teds has found that genetic

influence is not only significant it's

substantial often accounting for more

than half of the differences between

children the twin study could show that

children's educational performance is

all environmental genetics has nothing

to do with it I'd be happy with that

because the embarrassment for us is that

so many things seem to be so strongly

genetic but and in fact educational

achievement in the early school years is

one of the most heritable things around

more heritable than intelligence about

60 70% of the differences between

children at seven when they're just

learning to read are heritable that is

due to genetic differences between the

children which I found is astounding

because I would have thought early on it

would just all be due to how much the

parents worked with the kids to get them

to read we studied phonics there's a

test called the tower um which is a test

of word reading recognition you read 20

words that were calibrated for seven

year olds you know that they should know

what they are bee cat dog and 30

nonwords and these nonwords are

phonetically possible words but the only

way you could get them is if you GB GB

for example you have to sound it out

phonetically because you've never seen

GB

before and so this test takes four

minutes you know two minutes and two

minutes and it was one of the most

highly heritable tests we have it's

about 70% heritable meaning the

differences in children's performance

are due to genetic differences between

them people make a big deal about these

familiar words which are supposed to be

automated cognitive processes versus The

non-familiar Words which are supposed to

be completely different cognitive

processes well we can show through a

technique called multiva genetic

analysis that it's the same genes that

affect these two things they're both

equally heritable and it's the same

genes that are involved more recently

Ted's published papers on the genetic

influence on GCSE exam results in the

UK remarkably Ted's found that all

subjects from science to Humanities

showed equally High

heritability I gave these lectures at

the department for education and that

convinced me that I should really focus

on impact of these findings and so I

gave talks at educational conferences

and summer festivals and that sort of

thing and that's when our first paper on

GCSE scores came out not surprisingly

based on what what I've been saying GCSE

scores were very highly heritable about

60% of the differences between children

was due to genetic differences I wanted

to package that in a way that would get

publicity so I went on talk shows I gave

lectures at the department for education

I got into a bit of a hoo-ha in the

media for example so these things all

kind of came together and got a lot of

attention from all the major newspapers

and um TV programs on science several

documentaries and it really made a

splash and it got people thinking about

genetics and educational

achievement these findings could have

far-reaching impact as it shifts how

people from policy makers to parents

think about what makes us who we are one

of the things that you always get asked

from educational uh types and including

the department for education is well

what are the policy implic ations of

finding genetic influence and it's

usually assumed that it's all bad news

it means it's sort of a right-wing

agenda or something like that and my

main message is there's no necessary

policy

implications of finding genetic

influence you could for example be have

a very right-wing perspective and say

based on my values what I think is there

are these very bright kids who are going

to do really well let's put a lot of

money in there and give them the very

best opportunities educate the best and

forget the rest it's been called but

actually you could have a leftwing

perspective which is called the Finish

model for example where you

say some children at the lower end of

the distribution are going to have a lot

of trouble they're not going to really

participate in society unless they can

reach some minimal levels of literacy

and numeracy they're not going to be

citizens they're not you know so let's

put all the resources that we need into

making sure everybody reaches some

minimal level of literacy and numeracy

So based on your values you can take

these data and have very different um

policy implications the essential

message of genetics is that children are

different genetically and so that

suggests that a more personalized

educational system is a good way to go

these issues are discussed in a book on

Ted's findings called G is for genes

what genetics can teach us about how we

teach our children it's been written by

Dr Katherine asprey whose PhD

dissertation was based on teds the goal

of the book is to start a conversation

about the role of genetics in

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education another important direction

for teds in the next decade will be to

move more into genomics by which I mean

looking at the genome the actual DNA sh

scratch traditionally DNA extracted from

white blood cells used to come from uh

blood it's expensive also it's quite an

invasive procedure we can now get high

quality DNA from saliva samples uh where

the participants can spit straight into

a tu so these are our DNA collection

packs um we've actually sent these out

to approximately 5,000 teds twins in

order for them to collect their saliva

into this packet and then they'll send

it back to us and we process it

downstairs in the labs in order for us

to sequence their DNA and run a number

of studies looking at learning and

various um cognitive abilities so once

the samples are received into the lab

they then get scanned into our uh lab

sample tracking system where they then

put into racks uh batches of 72 samples

and then they're brought forward for DNA

extraction an average study now will

involve 500 to a th000 and manually we

can't do this kind of work anymore so we

have to involve Robotics and automation

the machine behind me will do a lot of

the basic diluting sample transfers the

DNA uh we put in there gets chopped up

into uniform chunks they are then uh

transferred into new uh smaller barcoded

tubes and racks where they can be stored

in a freezer at minus

80° combining this new molecular

information with the 20 years of

traditionally gathered twin study data

takes teds into exciting New Territory

and will help to speed up the process of

applying new developments in basic

science to Everyday aspects of life

including Education Health and

well-being with a chip the size of a

postage stamp you can measure millions

of these DNA differences between people

and it's now very cheap say like 40

pounds or something like that to do this

so that's revolutionized genetic

research modern genotyping machines like

we have here they can scan a single

sample for 900,000 probes and roughly

about a half an hour being able to have

this DNA to back up the data that's been

collected it's um it's an amazing

valuable resource because we have this

twin method we can get at the bottom

line of genetic influence whereas the

DNA studies start way down here at DNA

sequence differences what we want to do

is to go on and identify which bits of

genes across the 23 pairs of chromosomes

to identify the specific DNA differences

and trying to pin down the body

biological processes that might be

involved that'll change everything we'll

begin to understand how those genes

affect cognitive

development the Ted's Legacy really is

the breadth as a real focus on

developmental psychology cognitive and

language development educational

outcomes mental health in terms of

emotional health behavioral problems and

we also have a lot of information

provided by the family

about the environments that they live in

their family Dynamics about how they

collaborate with one another and all

these variables can also feed into

thinking about the cognitive and

language outcomes the educational

outcomes and the emotional and

behavioral outcomes and so it's the

richness and the depth and breadth of

that data over such a long period of

time tids is also the perfect natural

experiment for looking at environmental

effects how we live and what we

experience can affect how we perceive

ourselves and our many different Life

Choices from subtle differences in

personality to gender identity our sense

of being a man or a woman I think at the

back of my head I've always known I've

always known you had brother you were

forever

different but I it's it's nice now he's

actually said it out loud and we can

just get on with it so it was no

surprise no um I think

I think for Mom it was kind of like a

are you sure are you are you really sure

are you sure love just like Mom think

about it now you got a boy without

getting pregnant again she got mess of

both words kind of thing I think he's a

lot more showy I think showy just maybe

a lot more out there

extroverted yeah I probably agree with

that and like maybe you wouldn't use the

word

showy well maybe I would I don't know um

no I think like cuz at school you always

the cool one

you definitely were that's right no you

Def and I was always more the like I was

Jay's

brother we did a perception study was it

this week um but I like now you can see

your results like straight afterwards

and you can see how you did we were like

comparing how's he doing you were

comparing I believe that Robert is one

of the most exciting and inovative

psychologists alive today there are a

lot of people doing research on twins

but Robert really passionately believes

about bringing those messages to the

broader field so that it's now well

understood in developmental psychology

that it's not genes or environment it's

both it's now well understood that the

interplay between genes and environment

is just as important as thinking about

one or the other I really think that

Robert's work and the publishing that he

has done and his numerous thought pieces

across the years have been very

influential in encouraging um

developmental psychologists around the

world the whole goal of medicine these

days is not to just have dramatic

interventions and therapies after

someone has a problem like schizophrenia

or obesity or depression it's to predict

and then to intervene to prevent because

as my mother always said an ounce of

prevention is worth a pound of cure and

it's really true we're not very good at

curing things you know like alcoholism

or schizophrenia but if we could predict

and then intervene to prevent we might

be able to have more of an impact and

teds is the ideal framework for that

sort of

work another very valuable aspect of

teds is that it's providing this huge

resource for any academics interested in

the type of data that we've collected

for years to come and it it's really not

at all uncommon for people to contact

Robert and say they're interested in a

particular aspect of the data and they

would like to look at that somebody

contacted me recently and said they'd

like to look at the health economics of

um moving into the workforce and how

that varied as a function of the choices

that that individual had made for their

a-level subjects so a completely

different project from the sort of thing

I'm normally involved in but a really

interesting and novel use of the

data there are so many reasons why it's

important for teds to continue that it's

hard to even explain them in a short

enough amount of time but probably the

main one is that it is one of the best

studied groups of twins in the world

today we've been in contact with these

families who've been so generous with

their time since these children were 18

months old and they're now starting to

turn 20 and we have information on them

across that full period of time and now

they're just reaching that important

transition into adult

life we want to study what's called

emerging adulthood this period that used

to be a short transition from education

to work and family which has now become

incred incredibly elongated and with

sweeping demographic changes in economic

patterns where you don't just get out of

school get a job for life and we're

interested in how genetics and those new

environmental influences what the

interplay is during this now long period

of development called emerging adulthood

now we could do that in a new twin study

but the real value of teds is we can now

look back at predictors environmental

genetic behavi behavioral predictors

from the first 20 years of

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life for me personally another really

important thing is to think about moving

into the next generation of teds so

starting to collect data on the children

of these teds twins as they move into

Parenthood because that will then be the

first time in the world we have a data

set where we have the same data on the

adult twins from when they were the age

they're now reporting on their child

being so we could have data on

2-year-old children of our adult twins

and we can look at that in the context

of the data reported by the twins moms

when they were two and that will allow

us opportunities that have never been

possible before the project just becomes

more and more valuable as time goes on

as it grows teds will continue to

provide new exciting and important

discoveries to help us better understand

how we learn and can best educate our

children and provide new information for

basic science and the prevention and

treatment of many different mental and

physical health

problems none of this would be possible

of course without the help of the 10,000

families of twins that together have

contributed to one of the most powerful

scientific resources in the

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world

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